


Shoreleave

by merellia



Category: Alliance-Union - C. J. Cherryh
Genre: Gen, Homecoming attempts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-17
Updated: 2019-12-17
Packaged: 2021-02-25 06:08:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21831247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merellia/pseuds/merellia
Summary: Vickie’s steady hand guided them into the dock. Thump. Bang. Clang.  The machinery of the dock grappled the heavy mass of Finity’s End into place and synced them once more with Pell Station.
Comments: 7
Kudos: 18
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	Shoreleave

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Serenade](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Serenade/gifts).



Vickie’s steady hand guided them into the dock. Thump. Bang. Clang. The machinery of the dock grappled the heavy mass of _Finity’s End_ into place and synced them once more with Pell Station. JR thumbed on the shipwide intercom. 

***

“ _We’re set, cousins_ ,” came from the bridge, “ _The ship is stable. We are in lock. Mainday one to stations_.” Fletcher listened distractedly to the rest of the message, busy thinking over matters of Pell: Bianca, the Wilsons, Melody, Patch, Satin: a year for them had passed already, an unusually swift return to Pell, though only a few months had passed of Fletcher’s time. . . .

A synthesized voice took over the intercom: “ _Section chiefs report for passport procedures_.”

“That’s you,” Jeremy said, ostentatiously helpful. Fletcher nodded thanks as he headed forward, the junior-juniors displacing his jumbled Pell-thoughts. All three of them had been especially attentive to Fletcher as they neared Pell. None had admitted to anything, but Fletcher didn’t need to work the problem to know they were anxious he’d change his mind and stay at Pell, leaving _Finity_ and all the cousins behind. 

Fletcher had no such plan, but junior-juniors on best behavior was nothing to dismiss quickly.

The downside was junior-juniors trying to pack their—and therefore his—schedule tight. How was he was to fit in a meet-up with Bianca when, “We want to go to the pet place first,” demanded Linda.

“It’s in Green,” said Jeremy, “I looked it up.”

“They’re artificial kicsim,” Fletcher reminded them. “Not pets.” He’d never had one, anyway; the last time there’d been a fad for them, he’d been trying to prove his way into his study program. The thought of it hit him with a pang; bioneer assignments with Jake and tape-study of trading practices still weren’t satisfying replacements. He tried to shrug the mood off as the conversation continued around him.

“They can be pets,” Vince argued. “They’re sims and robots, but pets don’t have to be living animals.” 

“Kicsim are better anyway,” Jermey said. He added with an explanatory frankness Fletcher remembered himself sharing in his early teens, “No shit to recycle.”

Vince smirked. “Hell, no tiger dung, or elephant—do you remember, the elephant in the vid zoo on Esperance—“

“So much piss!”

The junior-juniors’ preoccupation with feces saw them through customs (the agent didn’t even raise an eyebrow, which Fletcher took as evidence of familiarity with kids) and Fletcher herding them to their sleepover, Shangri-La, which to Fletcher’s relief was so new that it had not been around during the low point of his teenage years, and so would not include him on its not-welcome list. 

Linda, Vince, and Jeremy twitched eagerly as they passed through the darkened lobby lit by the flickering lights of the retro games for which the Shanghai-La was known. “Kicsim shop, then games,” Linda said.

“Then that place high in Blue, do you remember, with the ice cream treats,” Vince added,

“The ones bigger than my head!” Jeremy agreed eagerly.

“Dinner first,” Fletcher interposed firmly, feeling twice his years in response to the kids’ insistence on consuming their weight in sugar. 

“That’s not—” Linda began, then checked herself.

“That’s fair,” Jeremy interposed quickly, shooting an anxious look at the others that Fletcher didn’t miss. “That’s reasonable, right, dinner then treats,” and Vince and Linda chimed in with Jeremy, “Yessir.”

***

JR preserved an even expression as he sat down with the other captains at the galaxy-dusted table of Pell’s oldest restaurant. Elene Quen and her husband had already been seated; when she flicked a glance at JR amid greetings to the other captains, James Robert and Madison and Francie and Alan, the Old Man said, “Newly risen to post.” 

Quen said, “ _Finity_ is rich in her succession.” JR tried reading past the stationmaster’s blandness as he sat, to see if Quen made a backhanded commentary on Finity’s losses among the crew, but she preserved an affable front. “It’s good to see you again,” she said, ordering a couple bottles of champagne from the waiter when she arrived. “When I hoped you might return more frequently than seven more years, I confess I didn’t expect it to be so soon.”

“Good trade, good news,” said Madison. 

“We’ll need to establish a new account, open to all ships, all ships to contribute,” said the Old Man. 

“The black market?” Quen asked.

“Receiving support for phase-out, on common agreement of captains,” said the Old Man. 

“The council of captains—” began Quen, and JR applied himself to taking in the nuances of the conversation, and what Quen planned to achieve in it.

***

Vince, Linda, and Jeremy could hardly hold still enough to interact with the kicsim. While Jeremy stroked the silk-velvet ears of a puppy with purple smartfur, Vince and Linda crowded around a tumble of kittens, their fuzz black as _Finity_ ’s patch and dashed over with starry white spangles. 

Fletcher wandered the store, idly eying a trio of mice that peeked up at him with big, liquid dark eyes, then linked their tails and shuffled upright. One of the mice clapped its paws to signal a beat, then the three began warbling a song in unison. He’d never caught interest in the fad before—the appeal of kicsim had not even registered given the possibility of working with Downers, of reuniting with Melody and Patch. But the mice were sort of cute—maybe the kind of thing Bianca might enjoy.

“You like these best, Fletcher?” Jeremy asked, suddenly appearing at his elbow, shadowed by Vince. 

“Best?” Fletcher shrugged. “They’re interesting.”

“Vince, Jeremy,” Linda called, “over here!”

Linda had discovered some other small, kicsim mammals—“They’re _hamsters_ ,” she explained—that were scurrying through see-through tunnels in a habitat designed to look like a merchanter’s ship, complete with multiple decks that offered individual sleeping spaces, and what (Fletcher supposed) was supposed to represent a hold in which several of the kicsim congregated, one with cheeks stuffed full of energy pellets, and another trotting around on a wheel. 

“Sirs may handle one if sirs wish,” said the woman who owned the shop (Fletcher had always avoided stores with human attendants: harder to fool, usually, than the ones where he’d sneaked tapes past the checkout machines). Jeremy, Vince, and Linda did not share Fletcher’s skepticism, however, and were quickly handling kicsim: Jeremy’s stood in the cup of his hand and washed a tiny nose and whiskers that glimmered at their tips with a rainbow of lights, like a fine spray of optic fibers. 

“All our kicsim can learn their names and respond to a number of commands, in addition to entertainment routines,” said the owner, her dark skin gleaming blue-black in the shop-light, emphasized by her electric blue bodysuit. “They can keep watch, and find and fetch objects too.”

Fletcher envisioned a future full of singing, independently mobile toys who could surveil him, and decided he was not in favor. “Didn’t you three want to play some vid games before dessert? We should probably leave now, if so.”

“If I had one of these, I’d name it Mallory,” Vince said, and Fletcher wasn’t sure if he was being deliberately ignored or if the juniors were so fixed on the kicsim that Vince hadn’t heard him.

“Pfff,” Jeremy said derisively. “I’d name mine Old Man,” and Vince and Linda looked simultaneously thrilled and appalled.

“Or we could go to a tape store,” Fletcher suggested.

But then Fletcher’s pocket-com went off, and he stepped away to check it: A message from Bianca, accepting his suggestion of a meet-up tomorrow. Now he just had to figure out how to get coverage for watching the junior-juniors.

***

The meal concluded, _Finity_ ’s captains had met briefly in the Old Man’s suite before dispersing to rest or responsibilities. 

“Quen’s daughter on our ship,” Francie stated flatly in distaste, hand cradling the growing curve of her belly.

The Old Man waved his hand, a dismissal. “It’s a non-starter, and she knows it. Only family’s shoes on _Finity_ ’s decks. But the problem’s real to her; the daughter will need more experience than in-system ships if she’s to make post on that new ship. Quen wants us to counter-propose, use our network to help her daughter to a place.”

“But what’s her leverage?” JR asked.

“And why didn’t she want to come out with it just then?” said Francie.

***

Fletcher found the senior-juniors at Earhart’s in Blue docks, waved in by Bucklin. 

“The junior-juniors?”

“In-suite until the end of alterdark,” Fletcher said.

“Good. Join us,” Bucklin said, and Fletcher settled cautiously into a chair, confident in the offer—which had become routine in every port after Esperance—but set uneasy by the number of cousins who had turned to him, speculation clear on their faces. 

“We’re trading stories,” Lyra said, setting down glasses, and pushing one towards Fletcher.

“Yes,” said Ashley, “And, Fletcher, you can tell a station story.”

Fletcher looked at them blankly, putting down the glass he’d begun to pick up. “What kind of story?”

“Toby just told one about the wails in the deep-dark, ghosts of lost spacers,” said Lyra.

“A stationer ghost story,” Sue proposed.

Bucklin poured some wine, pale as the sunlight on Downbelow, into Fletcher’s glass, and Fletcher took a quick sip as he thought quickly over the possibilities. “Well, there’s one about the station tunnels here. . . .” he began slowly, trying to feel his way through the conversation. If the desire for a stationer-story was meant to remind him he was from outside, and still didn’t fit in, truly.

“Go on,” said Nike, handfuls of her slim, black braids sliding over her shoulders as she leaned forward, elbows resting on the table. 

“So there was a man, and he hated his wife,” Fletcher began, then hastily tacked on an explanation for ship-cousins, “they stayed together because her station-share was greater than his, and he liked the luxuries that afforded. But he wanted to control them.”

Incomprehension faded from his cousins’ faces, replaced by understanding: stationer greed, he knew they were thinking.

“More than her, though, he hated her kicsim. It was a small mokona, which are fantasy creatures kind of like rabbits. . . . It always seemed like it was watching him, and he hated it. One day he even came home, drunk, and when he found it by his and his wife’s bed, staring at him—he cut the tip off one of its ears.” Sue grimaced in disgust. 

“Ever after the mokona avoided him, and his wife said nothing, so she must not have known. And he was satisfied.

“But he still hated his wife, and with every luxury she afforded him, he grew more jealous and more bitter. He started picking at her—saying stuff like, it was good she could share these things, because otherwise what did she have.

“He got to her, and she gave more, but he still wasn’t content. He began to imagine: if she’d only die, he’d inherit her station-share, since they didn’t have a kid, and then he could do as he liked.

Fletcher explained how the impatient husband had eventually killed his wife and hid her body behind the paneling of a disused station tunnel. More disgust from cousins, whom—as he’d learned when Paton didn’t make it through one of their last jumps—preferred being sent into the black: “Infinite finity,” Madelaine had said quietly as he stood by her shoulder for Paton’s wake. 

Fletcher explained how station station security investigated the wife’s disappearance, suspecting the husband, but finding no proof. Until the day they accompanied him through the tunnels, and came to the disused one—“but it wasn’t empty, it was full of a wailing noise, a horrible, high-pitched scream. Of course, they demanded the tunnel be investigated, and they opened the panels, and they found her—and the mokona, which had been in her pocket, and had been the source of the howl, the shrieking,” Fletcher concluded, taking a sip of his wine.

“Ugh,” said Ashley, looking satisfied. “Not bad,” Toby agreed. “They probably mind-wiped the man after.”

“Yeah, it was likely a Union station. That’s how they made the first azis,” said Chad.

“Nike next,” Sue said.

Fletcher caught Bucklin’s eye and, under Nike’s excited cry, said, “Favor. Can someone spell me from junior-junior duty for an hour mainday tomorrow?”

Bucklin frowned. “What’s the need? Section chief isn’t for skiving off.” 

Fletcher bit back both a surge of irritation and a sharp response. “Visiting my—” he made a split-second substitute, “last foster family. Since I didn’t get to say goodbye.” He briefly envisioned trying to explain to Bucklin, or any of the cousins, Bianca as his almost-maybe-girlfriend, and their likely skepticism at the idea of prolonging ties with a gravity-bound stationer, and felt better for the decision to lie.

Bucklin eyed him, but offered a plan, contingent upon Fletcher having his pocket-com ready at all times, and Fletcher headed back to the sleepover, satisfied.

***

JR checked the messages on his pocket-com, and frowned in surprise, then forwarded it to the Old Man, Madison, Alan, and Francie. _Quen’s daughter wants a meet_.

***

“No,” said Fletcher. “Absolute no.” He could barely believe this. It was one thing to be concerned he’d leave _Finity’s End_ , but another altogether to try to become part of his private business.

“But we don’t want to stay here,” Linda said.

“If you’re going to meet your foster people, we want to meet them.” Vince looked immobile.

“We want to tell them something,” said Jeremy.

“You aren’t going to tell them anything because you aren’t going to see them.”

“We’ll trade time-favors,” Linda offered.

“It’s not a negotiation.”

“We want to see where the stationers live. It will be educational,” said Vince.

“We’ll make Wayne’s life hell. He won’t do you favors ever again,” promised Jeremy. “And we’re your crew. You can’t leave us behind.”

Fletcher stared at the three of them, _Finity_ ’s three afterthoughts. The group he would have been a part of, if Francesca hadn’t been sick, hadn’t had to leave the ship, if he had survived aboardship when all the other children had died. The group reaching to him, time and again, giving and demanding what he’d wanted as long as he could remember: belonging. They were still wearing the brown sweaters they’d got to match his, to mark themselves a unit dockside.

Hell.

***

 _Jamie, schedule it solo_ , read the Old Man’s message to JR. _Take care of it_.

***

Fletcher couldn’t decide if he were relieved or worried that, after explaining that he was not meeting the Wilsons but a friend (an explanation that had led to some sharp looks from Vince), he, Vince, Jeremy, and Linda had made it to Changes Café before Bianca. It was a nice place in Green, the kind of place that the parents of Family kids might go to for a change of pace. He’d chosen it after some careful thought, less _look what you’ve lost_ —Fletcher wasn’t trying to renew or start something up between them, that wasn’t in his future, as much as he’d liked the idea once that she might be—but more _I’m well and value your friendship_. And maybe also a bit _Sorry I caused you problems_. He hoped it wasn’t too much to rely on a choice of location to communicate.

“I might want some Downbelow hot chocolate,” Jeremy announced.

“If you order, it’s coming out of your credits,” Fletcher said, “since you invited yourselves along.” He swiped his crew card through the table reader, the first purchase he’d made on station since their arrival, and would reconcile the charges that night.

Fletcher was distracted from the kids’ downcast expressions by Bianca’s arrival. Her hair was dark as ever, her olive skin a bit paler now that she’d returned from Downbelow to Pell’s artificial environment. And she was accompanied by another girl, about Bianca’s age and height, with darker skin and thick, curly black hair. Fletcher saw her right as Bianca saw Jeremy, Linda, and Vince. 

Bianca broke into a grin, and she and the other girl sat down across the table. “I guess we both moved on,” she said. “Though they’re a bit young for you, I’d have thought.”

Fletcher sputtered, appalled, “I—they’re—we’re _cousins_.” Then took himself in hand, smile, no hard feelings here. “But yeah. Being on the ship has been—something else.”

“I’m glad,” said Bianca Velasquez, and then introduced her companion, who reached out to shake Fletcher’s hand. “This is Rikke Kieler. My girlfriend.”

***

JR met Alicia Quen in one of the smaller merchanter bazaars in Yellow: her suggestion. She didn’t mind, then, other merchanters recognizing her and the meeting, but didn’t want it to get very quickly back to her mother.

She entered with a quick stride, finding him almost immediately, but made her way more circuitously to his side. She was taller than her mother, older than him physically, but (insofar as he could judge stationers’ ages, a skill improved only slightly via proximity to Fletcher) he thought he had about ten years’ experience on her. She proved more direct than her parent, saying after a brief greeting, “I won’t keep you. I just wanted to ask, knowing I’ve no way to return the grace now, for your help. Please tell my mother no to taking me aboard _Finity_. I’ve other plans in play.”

“But you need the time your mother would take to try convincing us to put them into action,” JR surmised.

“Indeed. And you should know—she plans to exert some pressure on your ship through that boy of yours: the one you took aboard at your last stop here.”

***

Fletcher followed the well-oiled tracks of social pleasantries he’d made himself learn in order to ease his way into the Downbelow study program, “Well met.” He gestured to the junior-juniors, “Jeremy, Vince, and Linda Neihart. Bianca,” he said to them, “was my friend in the Downbelow study program. And the Keiler family founded it,” he added with a quick glance at Rikke.

She nodded. “Bianca and I met up here—after you left.” Hot chocolate arrived for the juniors, and they sipped eagerly.

Bianca smiled at her, reached out and clasped Rikke’s hand. “You were good company. Still are,” she added, then turned to Fletcher. “We’re scheduled to return Downbelow next season, now we’ve completed the program.”

Fletcher schooled his expression carefully, and his own thoughts, not wanting to let might-have-beens and jealousies distract him. Tried navigating the shoals of an apology that didn’t dredge up muck best left beneath the waves of Old River. “I’m glad,” he said after he hoped what wasn’t an overlong pause. He pulled an item out of his pocket, pushed it across the table. “Thought you might find this interesting.” To Rikke, he explained, “It’s something I picked up on one of our station stops. Mementoes, or for trade.”

“Fletcher was promoted to junior crew chief when we reached Mariner,” Jeremy added. 

Bianca looked up from the pin cupped in her hand, “From Esperance—it’s traveled such a long way already,” she said, and smiled at Fletcher as she pinned it to her blouse, as prominent as some Family women wore jewelry pieces. She continued, “You might like to know—this spring was good for the Downers. Lots of babies. One couple even had twins.” She caught Fletcher’s gaze as she said that. 

And Fletcher knew that she did understand, and she held no grudge. She was telling him about Melody and Patch. And their babies—they must be so thrilled. Fletcher was, he told himself fiercely, glad for them.

“Crew chief?” Rikke asked, “You’re his crew? I hope you’re being good for him.” She was nice, but clearly didn’t understand the difference between spacer and stationer ages; she was treating the juniors as if they were only the age they looked.

Fletcher interceded before any of the three could say something snide or blow up. “They’re great. We would have all been the same age, had my mother stayed on ship. Why don’t we order some things to eat, now you’re here?”

Fletcher was enjoying the surprised glance Rikke flicked from him to the trio and back again, when his attention was caught by a pair of men entering the Café. They wore eye-contact screens, discrete suits.

Just then his pocket-com went off, signaling a message. He reached for it, but before he could pick it up to read the message, the two men had approached his table. 

“Fletcher Neihart?”

He narrowed his eyes at them. The rest of the table froze, looking between the two men and Fletcher, suddenly silent, cautious—wary. “Yes.” They were clearly station security, and his stomach twisted itself into a queasy knot.

“Please come with us. Stationmaster’s order,” one said.

“And if I refuse?” Fletcher asked, ignoring a tug by Jeremy on his sleeve. “I’m not a minor nor a citizen of Pell.”

“Stationmaster’s order,” said the one. 

“Fletcher,” Jeremy said, troubled.

Fletcher swept a glance around the table. Bianca’s eyes were large, round with unease; Rikke’s expression had shuttered—distrust of him or caution around security; he wasn’t sure. Vince’s mouth was tight, Linda plucked anxiously at the table linen, and Jeremy looked ready for—something. Fletcher felt sure it wouldn’t end happily.

He stood. “I’ll go,” he said roughly. He stood, tipped his head at his tablemates. “They’re free to leave?”

“We have no orders regarding them.” 

“Then, let me just—” he took out his pocket-com, only to have one man hold up his hand. He eyed them incredulously. “Really?”

“Stationmaster asked us to secure your com. Temporarily.”

Fletcher snorted. “Yeah, I’m sure.” He jerked his chin at the junior-juniors. “You go tell Bucklin right away.” To Bianca, he said, “Sorry again. Can you make sure these three—”

“Of course,” Bianca said steadily. “I’m sure it’s some mistake.”

“My life is full of them,” Fletcher said dryly.

***

Well out from the station, at the limit of the farthest buoy, a ship kicked into jump range and immediately began dumping velocity. As the _Hadji Murat_ neared Pell station, its black box shot news into the station systems. 

***

Fletcher entered Quen’s office with what little grace he could muster, but seething inwardly. _Smile, smile,_ he told himself. Don’t let her get you or get to you.

Dark brown suit, aides, security. Quen stood, dismissed the aide and security, after placing Fletcher’s com on her desk, with a flick of a hand. She assessed him coolly. “Fletcher,” she said after a moment, and offered him her hand.

He took it, shook perfunctorily. “You arrested me,” he said.

“Arrested is a strong word,” she said with a slight smile. “Let’s say I had an urgent need to talk to you. You left rather swiftly last time.”

“Through your assistance,” he parried, crossing his arms.

“Yes, that assistance . . . leapfrogged over a number of citations from your parting work Downbelow,” she commented lightly.

Fletcher’s heart beat faster. “Am I being charged with something?” he asked bluntly, deciding not to play into Quen’s evasiveness.

“Fletcher,” she said, moderate, pleasant. Probably that he wouldn’t play her game, and damned if he would.

When he didn’t respond, she sighed, as if disappointed in him—hell to that—and said, “Do you want transferred back?”

He stared at her. Then said, shortly, “No.” He unbent enough to add, “Thank you.”

She gave him a smile that said she knew him, knew the lure of space, and had suspected all along that this would be the outcome of his departure on _Finity_. It enraged him—here she was, twisting him around again, moving the pieces of his life at a whim. “The station could use you,” she said then, to his surprise. “Perhaps, if you’d stay—Downbelow could use you.”

***

JR’s pocket-com alerted him to an incoming message, and before he could check it, it alerted to another. 

_Stationmaster security came for Fletcher_ , said one from Bucklin.

 _Report to captain’s sleepover quarters soonest,_ read the one from the Old Man.

JR forwarded the first to Madelaine in Legal, tagged _utmost urgent_ , which would bypass all restday silencers on her own com, and began to walk as quickly as he could, without breaking into run that would gain him too much attention, back through the tunnels towards Green.

***

On the desk in Quen’s office, Fletcher’s pocket-com alerted with multiple messages. At the same time, Quen’s com system chimed, and chimed again.

Quen paused in whatever cat-and-mouse game she was trying to lure him into, and checked the com system. “She did _what_?” Quen exclaimed incredulously. “ _Le Cygne_?”

Quen’s office door opened abruptly. The aide entered again. “An urgent message for you, ma’am, and you have a—”

To Fletcher’s astonished relief, Madelaine entered hard on the heels of the aide. “Stationmaster,” Madelaine said abruptly, “You’ve improperly detained a spacer from _Finity’s End_ —”

“Stationmaster,” the aide blurted, “ _aliens_. A ship has arrived—Earth’s made contact with spacefaring sentients and—”

Fletcher took advantage of the distraction to acquire his pocket-com and thumb it to flick through its messages. Most prominent among them—flashing urgently—was also the most recent: _All crew report for immediate boarding. Repeat: Leave cancelled. Boarding now._

He should have known that returning to Pell would never work.

***

JR made sure to follow up with Bucklin as soon as the two were both aboard, Bucklin and all the other juniors prioritized for boarding even among the long lines engendered by cancelled shoreleave: the ship’s youngest secured quickest (and probably wisest, given the junior-juniors’ propensity for troublemaking). “Fletcher?” He asked Bucklin.

“Aboard, sir,” and JR felt anew dissatisfaction at the distance that had, of necessity, grown between them, that would persist unless Bucklin played aide and orderly. In the meantime, he could reach out as a captain, but these conversations lacked their old comfort. “Madelaine intervened, although timing worked in our favor: the news from her daughter and the _Hadji Murat_ arrived simultaneously. After that Quen had other issues.”

“Satisfactory?”

“Fletcher mentioned something about unspecified charges related to his last departure from the planet. Might not be resolved.” 

JR restrained a grimace: would this lead to another decade’s wrangling over Fletcher? “Report that to Madelaine in Legal.”

“Sir. And—”

“The matter of Fletcher’s training. Your idea,” JR said, taking slight reassurance in the familiarity of sharing a train of thought with Bucklin. “We’ll talk on the other side of our first jump.”

***

“ _Cousins_ ,” announced the shipwide com, “ _apologies for the interrupted leave, but we think you’ll find the reasons of interest. We’re off to Earth by way of Tripoint, pursuing not only our work of the past year, but also verifying some recent news: that new spacefaring species have exchanged contact with Earth. Politics may be getting a shaking-up, but we hope you’re buckled in and ready for a shakedown flight. . . ._

“This is going to be so wild,” Jeremy gushed, thumping noises interspersing his conversation as he secured himself above Fletcher’s head in his bunk. “I can’t wait!”

“Got pills? Tape?” Fletcher asked, settling himself in.

“Yeah and yeah. What do you think they’re like? The news said something about meeting a probeship, the ECM Ulysses. Do you think they’ll fight? Trade?”

The synthetic voice came over the com. _Take hold. Take hold_. Around them, _Finity_ rumbled a basso counterpoint as it began gathering _v_ , pushing them into their bunks.

A muffled noise caught Fletcher’s ears. “What’s that?”

“What’s what?” asked Jeremy.

It sounded like—it sounded like a tune. Muffled, as if—a frisson ran along his spine—as if coming from behind a panel. Or, he thought, brushing that aside, a drawer of stashed contraband. “Did you leave your com on?”

“My c—oh! Yeah.” 

The tune sound shifted to a small thump. Another. “You didn’t,” Fletcher said definitively. “Jeremy…” 

“Come on, Fletcher!”

“Out with it.” The thumping repeated, as if an object were repeating the same action on a loop, but kept running into the same obstacle. 

“It was so decadent! I had to!”

“Jeremy! _What is making that noise_?”

“I taught it to sing some of the boarding songs!”

“Jeremy!”

“You’re going to like it, Fletcher, I swear!”


End file.
